Pope Francis: Open your heart to the Holy Spirit
It is only the Holy Spirit Who can teach us to say: “Jesus
is the Lord.” That was the focus of Pope Francis’ reflections during the morning
Mass at the Casa Santa Marta on Monday. The Holy Father emphasized that we must
open our hearts in order to hear the Holy Spirit, and thus be able to bear
witness to Christ.
“Be calm, I will not leave you orphans; I will send you an
advocate, the Holy Spirit, to defend you before the Father.” Pope Francis based
his homily on the long discourse of Jesus to His disciples at the Last Supper.
The Pope dwelt especially on the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, who accompanies us
and “gives us the assurance of being saved by Jesus.”
The Holy Spirit, the gift of Jesus, is the travelling
companion of the Church
It is only the Holy Spirit, the Pope said, Who teaches us to
say, “Jesus is the Lord”:
“Without the Holy Spirit, none of us is able to say it,
to perceive it, to live it. Jesus, in other places in this long discourse, said
of Him [the Holy Spirit]: ‘He will lead you into all truth,’ He will accompany
you towards the full truth. ‘He will bring to your remembrance all that I have
said to you; He will teach you all things.’ That is, the Holy Spirit is the
travelling companion of every Christian, and also the travelling companion of
the Church. And this is the gift that Jesus gives us.”
We must open our hearts to the Holy Spirit; otherwise, He
cannot enter in
The Holy Spirit, he continued, is “a gift, the great gift of
Jesus,” Who does not lead us astray. But where does the Spirit dwell? the Pope
asked. He looked to the first reading, from the Acts of the Apostles, where we
see the figure of Lydia, a dealer in purple cloth, someone who “knew how to do
things.” The Lord opened her heart, so that she might follow the Word of God:
“The Lord opened her heart so that the Holy Spirit could
enter, and she became a disciple. It is precisely within our hearts that we carry
the Holy Spirit. The Church calls the Spirit ‘the sweet guest of the heart’: He
is there. But He cannot enter a closed heart. ‘Ah, but where can one buy the
keys to open the heart?’ No! That too is a gift. It is a gift of God: ‘Lord,
open my heart so that the Spirit can enter it, and I can understand that Jesus
is the Lord.’”
This, the Pope said, is a prayer that we should say every
day: “Lord, open my heart so that I can understand what You have taught us; so
that I can remember Your words; so that I can follow Your words; so that I can
come to the fullness of the truth.”
Let us ask ourselves if our hearts are truly open to the
Spirit
Our hearts must be open, then, so that the Holy Spirit can
enter, and so that we can hear the Spirit. Pope Francis said the readings of
the Mass suggest two questions we can ask ourselves:
“The first: Do I ask the Lord for the grace that my heart
might be opened? The second question: Do I seek to hear the Holy Spirit, His
inspirations, the things He tells my heart that I might advance in the
Christian life, and that I too might bear witness that Jesus is the Lord? Think
about these two things today: Is my heart open? Do I make an effort to listen
to the Holy Spirit, to what He tells me? And so we advance in the Christian life,
and we too bear witness to Jesus Christ.”
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